Oh my goodness. Off of a weekend that has seen a wild, gruesome,
gory main event for the Premiere Boxing Champions, a debut pay per view
on Amazon Prime, including the full fight card there. But that was not
all. We back up to Friday night, Oscar Valve there is tremendous knockout
in his ESPN top ranked main event, a win for Zerdo Ramirez that captures
a cruiserweight world title in the Golden Boy main event. A tremendous fight on
Sunday among British heavyweights in the Boxer main event shown in the US on Peacock
Wow, A ton to go over on the Fight for Each to night recap.
Hello, I'm the somewhat competent host TJ. Reeves. He is our
insider Dan Rayphiel. Listen, we have got a ton to go over.
Thank you for finding us, rate us, review us, it helps us
out find us on Apple, Spreakers, Spotify. So much to go.
First, of all, you and I are crotchety. Duke has lost it
screwed us both up. We don't like that in the March madness. But
man, there's so much boxing good gracious, so are you ready to get
into it? Because we've got a ton of fights, a ton of fights,
all right. I have been watching box let's begin. I've been watching
boxing for forty five years of my life. At least you are my contemporary,
my same age. I don't know that I have ever seen anything as
gruesome, gory, bloody outside of like a Friday the Thirteenth movie or Nightmare
on Elm Street movie. Uh what oh gore factor, he's twenty seven,
Tim Zuo and Sebastian Fondora. Fondora gets the decision. But good lord,
that was squeamish stuff. Dan, welcome and go ahead. I got to
turn away. A couple of times. I've told the story about being ringside
for Paul Briggs Thomas adamk light heavyweight title fight where Thomas adamak bled for the
entire fight from his broken nose that he had broken two weeks before the fight
but refused to pull out. And I got queasy that fight being right there
and that this reminded me that. But I, like you, I've been
watching boxing most of my life. I've seen and been ringside for, and
watched on TV numerous fights with hillacious cuts and injuries and blood. That's normal.
That's expected. It's a blood sport, as they call it, but
I can never remember a time where both guys were not only had bloody issues,
but it was to that massive degree because the Zoo cut on the top
of the head is the grossest thing I've ever seen in boxing in terms of
the amount of blood. And then if you look at Fondora, he was
messed up because the nose in the mouth a lot of it. He was
probably swallowing it so it didn't look as bad. But you know, I'm
snapping like pictures of screenshots, and these two men are covered head tiptoe,
front to back, TJ. It was like a fucking murder scene. I
mean, I'm not being emotional. It was horrible, absolutely hillacious, And
look, we got a lot to get into on this particular fight, but
I'm going to start off with this. I bow to Tim zoo Man.
It was one of my favorite fighters before this fight. Massive respect for his
willingness to fight whoever, the whole thing with the dog bite. I was
a big fan of his father, watching the way he's conducted himself, dealing
with his media obligations, willingness to come to America, taking fundor on twelve
days. Notice. Oh, by the way, I'm gonna switch from a
five to eight guy to a six six guy. Oh, by the way,
he's gonna turn around, he's gonna be a left handed. Didn't even
blink an eye. That's a real fucking fighter. Okay, that's a guy
I'll fight anybody, any place, anytime, anywhere, whatever. That's the
epitim of it. And then to see what he did in the fight where
he got a gaping fucking wound on his head, an accidental situation. He
was ducking down, he banged into, you know, the the tip of
Fundora's elbow and it just ripped open the cut. So it wasn't on purpose,
and it was a terrible, terrible injury. And as you know,
it's there's nothing to you know, there's no muscle, there's no uh,
you know whatever, there's no nothing to right tissue. Yeah, you're right
on the right on the bone. Basically impossible for a cutman to keep that
close for more than a few seconds. I don't you know, it was
just a bad cut out. There's been a lot of conversation about the corner
not having the right medication in the corner. I don't know if that's true
or not, because I'm no medical expert on closing wounds, but I'm gonna
tell you this, the wound happened. Kim Zo easily wins round one,
dominates round two, and I'm like, he's gonna wipe this guy out.
He's gonna knock him out, He's gonna you know, is he gonna get
me my over? Here's the question? Uh? And I got the sue
Ko and I'm taking the same thing. Watching the page. He looked,
he looked really really really sharp for one round and like two minutes and you
know, fifty seconds of the second round and you're like, this is gonna
be a wipeout. And then the the cut happened on the fact, on
the accidental head, you know, not the elbow, and it changed the
whole fight. Obviously, he couldn't see. It was clear it was coming
down his face. It was all over him. Fondora's dealing with his own
shit because of the nose and the and the mouth and the blood that he
he's dealing with. But he, you know, at least he could see.
And a lot of fighters and I've seen it before, you know,
they're gonna live to fight another day, and you know I can't see.
The referee asked him, do you want to continue? And he said yes.
Now, he could have got out of that fight right there before the
end of round four. It would have been a technical uh you know,
it would have been a no contest. He could have he could have gotten
out of it after like round five. And where we're so, that's where
I want to pick up where it's pretty confident he's ahead. That's what I
was going to say. Decision. I mean, the line of demarcation is
the fourth round, right, And then to reprise you into round four,
did it surprise you because it surprised me that his corner wasn't a little more
proactive on this cut isn't going to close. Bad things are only going to
continue to happen with the blood. I mean, it's a catch twenty two
for everything you just said in the build up about him being brave, the
son of a Hall of Famer, wanting to make mega money, wanting to
show that you're that kind of guy that will fight through this and win.
But I just I thought long about round four or five, go to the
cards, and whatever happens happens, and if the public demands a rematch,
Go have a rematch. But to me, to me, taking away the
emotion of it, taking away with the reaction is going to be if they
made it so he can't come out for the you know, for round five
or for round six, where you're pretty confident that he's winning on the cards,
then you do that. You act like the adult. I know the
fighter is there, but you are the corner. Your job is to do
what's best for the fighter, period, end of story. Don't matter what
I say, doesn't matter if a fan booze, you do what you gotta
do. And so as I look here on the official scorecard after the fourth
round of the fight, you know when they could have clearly stopped to fight.
So one judge after four it's thirty eight thirty eight. It was actually
thirty eight thirty eight across the board, so it would have been a draw.
He would have kept this title. After round five he's actually down on
two score cards. But you're not got a gamble. You could you could
have probably got out of there at the end of four, got a draw.
No one would have said anything. Yeah, you don't lose, you
know, you lose your perfect record, But you know you live to fight
another day. I thought they were kind of derelict in the way that the
courter operator now to Zoom. To Zoo's credit, he wanted to fight.
Yeah, the fighter wants to fight. We agree the fighter wants to fight.
But in that I can't believe he made it through twelve rounds like that.
I know right now, especially with the amount of blood in the third
round. In the fourth round, they had to know, we're not going
to be able to close this. This is not going to get any better
unless they just believed, and they they didn't seem to be encouraging him.
Unless I missed this, They didn't seem to be encouraging him. Go get
him, Go get him out of here, Go knock him out, unless
they believe he can knock him out here in the fourth round, the fifth
round of the sixth round, and then we don't have to worry about this
anymore. But it's easy for us to sit back and say that. But
Zoom wanted to keep fighting, and my god, it was Corey, and
then let's win the Fundora. He won, He won the fighter, he
got his hand raised. What did you think as the fight war on?
Did you think Fundora was winning because on the broadcast Abby they had on this
first ever PBC on Amazon broadcast Joe Gooseen doing the scoring. And if I'm
not mistaken, he gave Fundorra like seven rounds in a row. Did you
have it that way? Did you? I had it? When the when
the fight was overheaded a draw one fourteen to one fourteen, and a lot
of people had that. And you know, in the end, the scores
were close because it was you know, it was one it was a split
decision. So it was one judge had Tim Zuo winning one sixteen to one
to twelve. One judge had it the same score for Ferndor, and then
one judge had it seven to five fifteen one thirteen for Frondor. But I'll
tell you this, I have all respect for Ferndor. He's a class act.
They acted appropriately everything, the way that they handled things, uh,
in the build up, taking the fight on short notice and stepping up to
the plate. And you know, he's always been sort of a humble kind
of guy. And and and I was glad to see, uh, the
way that they everybody got together able to you know, a lot of respect
between them. Tim Zu, God bless him. Never once did anything other
than you know, credit to the guy that won the fight. Didn't last
moment about the cut, just you know, he just acted like you're supposed
to act. Uh Now, all that's said, it is my feeling,
and I can't be proven right or wrong. But my personal viewpoint is if
the cut doesn't happen, that tim Zu beats him up and just wins handily.
My opinion, that did not happen because when the fight happens, crazy
shit happens, and that's that's boxing you got to deal with, you know,
of what's going on in the in the let's call it the crucible of
the fight. And tim Zu found himself in the crucible of the fight and
he came out the other end and he has nothing to be ashamed of.
Yeah, he lost a split decision, but you know with blood bloodshed that
wasn't just blood. That was bloodshed that was like you know, like I
said, like not even like exaggerate, like a murder scene like a horror
movie. And so hopefully, you know, he heals up quick. And
you know, there was a lot of uh not straight talk if you will,
about if there's what the status of the rematch clause would be afterwards the
Fondora team, Samson, Lukewitz's promoter, I'm quite sure that there's a rematch
clause. I can't fathom that they would have done this fight like this on
twelve days notice without getting that assurance skin him and that it's not a mandatory
fight. But but Samson was up there at the news conference afterwards at the
Team Obilerina where both fighters were as directly by members of the media and they
both deferred and would not answer. And then Tim then uh, you know,
after after Tim and Fandora had their say, Samson, who was his
promoter of Fondora, basically was like he was very, very shaky. His
response, we have a verbal rematch. He's gonna probably have to wait.
We're gonna do another fight. Obviously. Errol Spence in the ring afterwards,
trying to talk that up, and let me just say one thing as an
aside, no offense to my man, Errol Spence, who I love.
If they give Errol Spence a chance to fight for the unified Jeromid Away title,
getting his ass destroyed, it didn't just lose losing, I get it,
that's that happens. I'm not I'm not anti, you know, don't
give a guy a shot if he loses. Fandora's coming off of loss in
this fight, got knocked out by Mendoza about one every other round of the
fight. Errol Spence at a lower weight got absolutely destroyed by Errol's by by
Terrence Crawford. Yep. And to me, the demand from the public,
if you're gonna put Fondora in a fight for those titles, it should be
either a rematch with tim Zo or it should be Terrence Crawford. Not great,
A great, There's no there's no momentum for that. I don't care
what they were trying to do there in the ring. And let's credit Fundorra.
You said it, but let's credit him further. He knew he had
broken his nose. He said that after the fight first round. He fought
through eleven more rounds through a broken nose and laid it on the line.
I know the opponent's bleeding badly, gory, brutal, but he gets his
hand raised and it gets very intriguing. Now at one point fifty four because
of this next Yeah, you know, I say it all the time.
Sometimes you're the windshielding. Sometimes you're the bug. And a year ago he
got knocked out cold basically by Mendoza. Everybody is on case. Oh he
was never much, he was nothing, blah blah blah. He takes the
time off, he gets himself together, he comes back, he takes the
fight against against Boachuk on the undercard and and gets called up to the main
event. When Thurman has the injury and he doesn't not take it. He
accepts it easily and he goes in there, you know, and again circumstances
occur, and at the end he won the fight. Whether you think that
if the injury didn't happen, Zoo would have one is irrelevant. You know,
we can talk about it. But at the end of the day,
he fought the twelve rounds under some dress himself because of the blood. Maybe
not as much as what Zoo was dealing with, but they both were handicapped
to some degree. And two judges thought it was pretty close and he gave
it to him, and one just thought it was pretty close and gave it
to Tim Zoo, and uh, nobody complained. They acted like class I
just I can't, I can't. That encapsulates everything that went on encapsulates what
boxing should be, including the bull should have bet the rematch clause, you
know, because there's no clarity on that. I mean, you know,
in my mind, I hate rematch pauses to begin with. So whatever,
But if anybody deserves a rematch, it's Tim Zoo. Yes, Theater of
the unexpected. He got a much tougher night. He more than showed what
a warrior he is. We overuse that. What a warrior though, to
try to fight through that, and I know you love nostalgia. We're gonna
move on to the rest of the card. It made me immediately think of
two fights in the way back Sean O'Grady WBC lightweight title fight that he was
winning in nineteen eighty and I went back in YouTube this and watched it,
and he suffered a clash of heads, a butt whatever against Jim Watt in
Scotland live fight on us TV, a fight that he's winning, a fifteen
round title fight, nasty two or three inch vertical gash in the middle of
the forehead, bleeding everywhere for two rounds. They stopped the fight. That
was two rounds, Dan two rounds, as you know. And then the
Vito and a Fermo rematch with Marvin Hagler had a clash of heads in the
first round up on the hairline. He's bleeding profusely. They had all the
controversy of where they're going to stop the fight after one round in d Q
Hagler or not. That's what anna Fermo's quarter one. I thought of both
of those fights immediately, because you and I are savants about this. I
don't have the mental roll index you do on gore factor. But anti Fermo
was bleeding all over the place for four rounds and they finally stopped the fight
and awarded it to Hagler TKO in the end result of the two reference points,
but they didn't bleed for ten rounds like tim Zu did. Graphically horribly
wow, I mean me. I actually thought that, like there needed to
be an adult in the room and that the fight probably should have been stopped
at some point. I can go to the cards or yeah, no,
no, no contest event. Do you believe just clarify it because you have
the insight. Do you believe there would have been any hesitation or dispute on
accidental foul? Go to the cards versus it's a TKO. He can't continue
fundural wins because some might argue that that the inexperience, maybe in Zoo's corner,
was the fear they're gonna stop this and we lose on a TKO.
If it was, yeah, I don't believe it would have been a TKO
because they knew it was an accidental foul. Okay, because of the elbow.
That's my perspective anyway. I mean, somebody could tell me I'm wrong,
but just in totality before we get into the rest of the show,
just taking the bird's eye view of the whole thing, This was a hell
of a show. And if you bought the fight for the seventy bucks,
the sixty nine ninety five, you damn well got your money's worth. Because
the two preliminary fights that were free on Prime, which was the Kermo Moten
the young Prospect, the one hundred and thirty pounder, he finally went some
rounds. He won every round basically, but it was a fun fight to
watch. The other preliminary with Mendoza was a heck of a fight with Boachuk,
and then can we go on through the pay per view card, But
I mean the pay per view as a total event was a very very good,
interesting entertaining. Hey, you're never gonna forget the main event for the
first ever PPC Amazon Car because of the gruesome factors. So Fundora is the
champ on the split decision win. Immediately before that, Isaac Pittbull Cruz scored
an impressive TKO knockout win for the WBA Junior Welterweight title over Roly Romero.
You and I both believe Cruz would win, but the end result is a
knock out. What did I tell you, pulm old Romero. As it
turns out, I told you that I just didn't see what all the hype
about Romero was. Ever, his resume stinks out loud. He's never being
anybody. His biggest win quote unquote win was Barroso, which was bullshit.
The way that they gave it to him. It's not his fault, but
the way that the referee gave him that fight, you know, out of
the goodness of his heart, by that premature, terrible stoppage. If you
go besides that, what does he have like a you know, he got
knocked out by Tank Davis and he's got what I think a win that he
barely barely won. Against like Jackson Marinez. I mean, the guy just
doesn't have you know, he's a great talker and fans sort of enjoy the
stick and everything. But in terms of like world class boxing ability, you
know, and a guy that you think might be like something special, you
know, serious world championship type of guy. I mean, I can't tell
you that. I'm I'm know everything about boxing, I know a lot,
but I just never saw that. I just think, you know, he
doesn't have a lot of fights. That was only a seventeenth professional fight,
and he's got a resume that you know what, he beat Anthony Ygott,
Okay, that's okay. Like I said, Marinas, he got he was
kind of lucky to get that win. He just has never fought anybody now
Pitbull and he also was a lightweight that had moved up and Pitbull crew.
Maybe not have the deepest resume ever, but he throws a lot of punches.
You know, he he looking to go get you. You know,
he willing to fight the best guys. He doesn't make a big thing about
it. He's just let me get in the ring and do my business.
And uh, I just felt like his aggression and the way that he threw
punches. I thought it would go longer obviously in terms of my my pick
on the fight, but I picked pipoll to Cruz to win this fight.
I just think Roly Romero again, I'm not, I'm not. I'm nothing
against him personally, I mean whatever, just as a fighter, the most
overrated guy that we've seen in quite some time. And I'm not Monday morning
quarterbacking. I've been quite some time, so this is not something new.
I mean, so Pitbull was a big fan favorite. I mean, the
crowd was going absolutely crazy for him. I mean he's probably I don't know,
maybe is he the most popular Mexican fighter right now other than Canelo Alvarez
that you know, in terms of active fighters. It's it's not out of
the realm. I think it's a pretty good chance. But yeah, I
look at Benavidez. I'm not you know, not the Mexican America. I'm
talking about like Mexican national in the country of Mexico. I'll tell you this,
I'm pretty sure that when Pittbull, who's been fighting mostly on undercards,
I can't imagine his next fight unless it's on like a big, big pay
per view, that his next fight should be probably the main event defending this
logical question. You know, I was coming here. Is Gervonte Davis on
the radar at some point, maybe not next, but I mean he gave
Davis a good fight and wants a rematch, and now he's got a title.
I think the fact that he's got a title first of all. You
know, Tank has not shown any interest at the moment anyway to go to
one hundred and forty. I think before you tangle with the rematch, in
my mind, you go out there and you make a bigger star, You
make some fights with some other junior Walter rates, you make some money.
That's the name of the game, and you put on you can put on,
you know, two or three good fights and then maybe the Tank rematch
will present itself. He doesn't need Tank right now. What he needs to
do is just stick to what he's been doing. Fight some good guys,
make exciting fights, get the fans revved up, you know, and you'll
make some good money and make a good legacy. But the Tank fight will
be there at some point. But you know, I thought that was a
really good port he look In the first round, he beat up Roly Romero,
so bad that I scored the round ten to eight with no knockdown,
and I was happy to see that one of the judges on the official score
cards also scored that fight ten rounds to eight or ten to eight on that
round because of that. Now I must get into the one aspect of this.
I know. Thank god the cards didn't matter because he stopped them in
round seven. But let's talk for a minute. Can we teach you about
Chris Flores? All right? You know where I'm going with this. Chris
Flores. Chris Lawes was one of the judges on this fight, and Chris
Lauris do you know? Okay, I didn't know his name, but I
knew you were going at the judge eventually. And this is the judge that
I can't say it with a straight voice, right Phiel. He had roly
winning the fight at the time of the stoppage. That is just I don't
even have words to describe the unconscionability. Is that a word? Don King
word? Unconscionability? So how about incompetent? Is that incompetent scoring? Point
blank? Yeah? I mean, how else could you look at it?
Now? Here's the thing that I didn't like about this. Chris Floores worked
Friday night in Glendale, Arizona, and was a judge on the Oscar Valdez
fight against Liam Wilson. To me, why are you bringing in a judge
from Arizona the next day after he worked late, you know, that show
in Arizona to bring in the next day. You get your rest, Get
a guy fresh, Get a guy that's got a good night's sleep, Got
a guy that's not traveling, that's you know, that's there that you don't
have to go running around and then sell many a down at ringside. So
I feel like the Commission is partly responsible for that, for making an assignment
unnecessarily. There's there's a pool of judges that's you know, you know,
a couple dozen deep they could choose from. You know, Chris Floores didn't
need that assignment in my opinion, after having worked a world title fight in
a different state the night before. So that's the first thing about that.
Now, in terms of the fight itself, in terms of that scorecard,
you have the two other judges. You have Patricia Morris Jarman, who's had
her issues in the past. She's got Pitbull had sixty eight to sixty four,
perfectly legitimate scorecard. I didn't agree. I thought it was wider,
but okay, I can't really quarrel with that. Max de Luca, from
a California based judge, been one of the top judges for a long time.
He had at sixty nine to sixty three, and him and Jarmin they
both gave him a round number three. I like that scorecard. That was
fine, that was legit, that was on the money. So we have
Pitbull winning the fight handling. Then we got Chris Flora. So I don't
know. I'm not out saying he's a bad person. I'm just saying you
cannot under any fucking circumstances have Roly Romero winning that fight. Here's the kicker,
by the way, TJ he had Rolli winning the fight sixty six to
sixty five at the time in the knockout, and he was the judge that
gave the first round ten to eight in favor of Isaac Kruz, so he
gave him the extra point in round one and still fucking had really ahead in
the fight. That is preposterous. He only gave Pitbull round one and round
seven. He gave Roly Romero the rest of the fight. I want to
fucking throw off from that depth. So that is just really well. We
keep going back to accountability, and we've we've discussed this over and over again
for the couple of years that you and I have been together. At what
point do you hold somebody like that accountable that? And you've just brought up
a great circumstance. This is why we love your insight. Why why did
the Las Vegas Commission have him in there when he was working the night before
in another state and having to travel and maybe that affected things too, But
where's the accountability on horrible scorecard in a big time fight like this. You're
not working another championship fight for another six months or a year in that jurisdiction.
I mean, where's the I don't know if it's not about being punished.
If you don't, you so what he comes back and does another city
cart in six months. Put him in some training, have him do a
workshop, get a little like tutorial. Let's let's uh, let's go on
practice a little bit, you know, uh, and make sure that we
can get it right. I mean the same way a boxer of spars and
practices or a basketball player goes to practice. We talking about practice, but
this is important for us, so that that was just such a fucking shitty
score partially is just ridiculous. And you know what, it will be lost
to history because Pitt Bull got the knockout and the two other judges had him
a head. But it still doesn't change the fact that it was horredinous what
but what do you always say the Lennox Lewis famous line, bring your own
judges? Just thank god? And you're left all right, finish up on
that card. You said in the preview mode that you were not going to
spend seven seconds on eras Landy Laura Michael Zarafa the Australian. It's a knockout
for Laura. Do you want to spend more than seven seconds to say anything
else about it before you move on? Well, I'll say this about Lara.
He's forty years old. He's still a good fighter. I never knocked
his talent or his ability. He's got an excellent straight left hand that can
knock out a lot of guys. Uh and he won the fight far and
square. I take nothing away from it. Was a nice knockout in the
secon round. Nothing really had happened in round one, barely anything had happened
around two, and then like in the last couple of seconds of the round,
he landed a beautiful straight left hand and put poor Michael zaro Off out
of his misery. Michael's are Off been waiting around for this mandatory since like
February twenty twenty two, traveled all the way from Australia, and I'm not
sure it was worth it because he never really had a shot to win in
my opinion. But what irritates about Arisloni Lara is not the man's ability,
because he's a good fighter. I can't knock over that. He's been a
champion, he's you know, he's a top amateur. He's you know,
he was in the Fight of the Year against Jared Herd back in twenty eighteen
and let it all hang out. I mean, he was a tremendous fight.
But the thing that has irritated the fuck out of me is the inactivity.
One fight in twenty nineteen, one one fight in twenty twenty one,
thout, one fight in twenty twenty one, one fight in twenty twenty two,
no fights in twenty twenty three, and now his cameo here in twenty
twenty four. I don't think I'm going out on a limb to say I'll
be shocked that he's back in the ring before the end of this year.
So he's had all those five fights since the middle of twenty nineteen, and
every one of them has been against a crap opponent. He's not fought anybody.
He fought Ramon Alvarez, Canelo's brother, who's not Canelo. He fought
a club fighter from the from the Northeast, you know, New engl and
Greg Vendetti. Thomas Lamana doesn't belong anywhere near a world title fight. Gary
ridiculous to have him in a world title fight. And now Zarafa who it's
not even lauris fault because the WBA my good friends over there and made this
dude the mandatory. So the guy fights once a year if you're lucky,
and he gets in, he takes care of business against guys that can't hold
his jocke and it's out. I mean, it's just ridiculous. So that's
me was a wasted spot on an otherwise outstanding card, all right. So
then Julio saysar Martinez l Ray gets his decision win over Angel Cordova and keeps
his WBC one twelve pound title. A quick on that and the recap.
This was a hell of a fight. This is what really sort of made
the pay per view in terms of besides the main event, we had a
tremendous battle between l Ray and Cordova. Remember they were supposed to fight each
other in December, you know what, but Martinez had some visa issue was
not able to get it squared away, and it was canceled off of that
final showtime card. But they promised they would put it back on and these
guys, they gave a great battle. They let it all hang out.
This was the opening fight on the pay per view. Original it was gonna
be on the free streaming, but because the when the card got pitt a
little bit rejiggered after the therm and injury, they put this into the pay
per view position. When they switched a couple of things around, and you
got your moneys where these guys went tooth and nail for twelve rounds. Cordovo
got knocked down twice in the third round was kind of weird. I don't
know if you saw that part of it, but he wasn't really hurt on
those shots. It was really jabs. I put him on his rear end,
and those two knockdowns kept Martinez. You know, from from I guess
it would have been a few add up the way that the scores were,
I believe it would have been a draw had he not gotten those two knockdotowns,
but he still would have kept the title. But that was a really
really outstanding fight to start things off. You gotta love the little guys.
And you know, Martinez is this fun of fighter out there to watch.
His only bugaboo has been, you know, getting in the ring. He's
had fights canceled, postponing this and that, visa this and and you know,
lots of issues here and there. He was sick one time. But
when he gets rolling, really good fighter and really fun to watch, vulnerable
but exciting and uh, you know, even though Cordova lost, I'll watch
him again any day. He showed a little bit of a little bit of
a showmanship and you know, it was fun to watch also, So do
you like those little guys. You know, Julio Caesar Martinez is as fun
to watch as anybody in him and Cordova made a good fight. I wouldn't
had seen a rematch of that fight if they made it. And listen,
there was a lot of action, There were knockouts, and the main event
will be memorable for the gruesomeness and the upset by Fondora beating Tim Zoo,
who was a five to one favorite and screwing up a potential Tim Zuo Terrence
Crawford that had been whispered about for now. Let's see if we get a
rematch in that, so that puts the fight card to bed. You got
anything else for that fight, cars, it's gonna touch real quick. On
the second of the two fights on the preliminaries, which were free on Prime,
and that was Boachuk one hundred and fifty four pounds contender against Brian Mendoza,
who had been on standby in case they needed somebody where he was in
camp with Zoo and you know he ain't prepared, and that was They made
that for the vacant WBC interim title, even though obviously the under you know,
the main event was for the vacant title, but titles aside, these
guys put on a hell of a show also. I mean, it was
a one sided fight in favor of Boachuk. But Mendoza's you know, you
gotta love the guy because he just never quits, never die, keeps on
coming forward. He had him a big moment there in the eleventh round where
he almost knocked Bohachuk down and had him a little bit staggered. But Boachuk,
let me tell you, dude's thirty good puncher. That's the first time
he ever went twelve round went the distance in any fight, whatever number of
rounds was scheduled for. He'd either scored knocked outs in his victories or he
went in one fight that he lost was a stoppage loss, so he saw
a final bell or hurt a final bell. And it was a really good
fight. So when I say it was a hell of a card, I
mean in the totality of the pay per view event and then the two additional
fights around the preliminary stream. Really it was a great night at the fights.
I gotta be honest, it was excellent, all right, good stuff
on that Now, simultaneous on Saturday night in Inglewood, California, the Golden
Boy de Own show history for Zerdo Ramirez, and I gotta give you props.
I did go out on the Limb on the bet Us Show and take
Arson Gula Mirian to retain his WBA Cruise Awey title again. He had not
had a lot of noteworthy fights making his US and the bottom line is Zerdo
moves up to cruiserweight and dominated for twelve rounds, got an easy twelve round
decision, and he makes history in the process doing it there in the main
event. Yeah, I mean he did a very very good job. He
was able to box Gula Marian. He was able to stand in the pocket
and make him miss and make him pay. He landed so many more punches
than Arson did you No, Arson, and Gula Marian is a pretty good
fighter. I think it's not like he's a bump. I said this in
the pre fight stuff. You may not have really ever heard of him,
but you had taken a few minutes and just looked at him on a on
a YouTube video, you would have realized that he's not just some you know,
some guy that's not a good fighter, not capable of being there.
He just couldn't keep up with the diverse game that Zerdo brought to this fight.
Whether it was his ability to move latterly, which is not the kind
of thing you typically see from him, the south BLUs stance, a lot
of punch output. I mean really just in all facets of the game,
did a really good job. In the copy box. Again, that's a
guide, was overwhelming in favor of Zerto. He landed like four times as
many or three at least three times as many punches overall for the fight as
uh as gold Marian did any threw you know, like one hundred plus more
and landed at like a much much higher percentage. So when you when you
best your opponent all three categories and it spread out over the period of fight,
you know you're gonna win, by the way. And this is what
really tells me when if you again, if you look at the stats and
use it as a guide, he didn't. Just according to their statistical breakdown,
he outlanded gol Marian in every single round. But it wasn't like ten
punches to nine or twenty two to like nineteen. He was out landing him
by numerous punches in every single round. And uh and that's that that spells
a victory. Teen He one eighteen to one ten on all three score cards.
And you gotta love the history because first of all, think about what
we're where. Rare Miras was not that long ago. He had been absolutely
uh dominated and just did nothing. Look horrible in as big as fight of
his career to that point where he lost to Bevil in a virtual shutout decision
for the light heavyweight title that he'd been begging for. That fight, loss
his undefeated record and got absolutely played with. Was supposed to have a fight
after that at light heavyweight, was so overweight, didn't even comes to the
way in the fight, got canceled a really messed up Golden Boys card.
They had to put the undercard in and it was just a disaster. Now
he moves up the cruiserweight, but only at one hundred and ninety three,
not the full two hundred that was. Last October, he fights Joe Smith,
a good fighter but similar in terms of a light heavyweight moving up,
and he looked great in that fight and he got the ten round decision,
but it still made your question, how's he going to do with a guy
that's a bonafide strong two hundred pound you know, tough dude with experience and
has a title and all that. And we saw against Glmarian he really looked
excellent, and you gotta love it. He makes the history that you mentioned,
I'll just shoot I'll let you know what that history was, because it's
pretty impressive. He becomes the first ever Mexican cruiserweight champion. Number one,
he becomes the heaviest Mexican born fighter to ever win a world title. I've
heard people talk about, well, Andre Uries won the heavyweight belts. Okay,
I don't take anything away for Andreuries. And yes, of course he's
Mexican, but he's he was not born in Mexico. He's not a Mexican
national. So if you want to do it in the statistical way that I
just mentioned, he's the first or the heaviest ever Mexican warn fighter to be
a world champion. He surpassed the previous history that was Canelo as when he
won a light heavyweight title in twenty nineteen, who also had matched the accomplishment.
And this guy has been forgotten in this conversation. A lot of people
mistakenly referred to it as only Canelo having done it. But there was an
excellent fighter back in the early two thousands that might be known by fighting Roy
Jones for the light heavyweight title. But he went over to Germany named Julio
Gonzalez from the southern California area, and he took on in the WBO title
challenge the undefeated Darius Mikkelchesi, who was forty eight and oh at that time,
there was a lot of tough stuff talking about how he's going to try
to match the Rocky Marciano number at forty nine to zero, even though it
was a different weight class. And he went and uh and and Gonzalez,
you know who died several years ago. Unfortunately, uh, he pulled a
huge upset and one one. And the reason why I don't forget about Julio
Gonzalez is because I remember when he was at the airport on the way back
to the United States after this glorious victory that uh, you know, was
a huge front page story in Germany. Uh. I did an interview with
him at the airport and wrote a story about it for USA Today, and
he was crying in that interview because he was so happy, croud of that
accomplishment. And I also had, you know, interviewed him other times because
I had covered his fight with Roy Jones for the light heavyweight time because at
that time, just to repeat it, he had become the heaviest Mexican to
ever win a title at that time, and then Canelo matched it, and
now Sdo has surpassed me more notably though, that was such a huge upset
when he came in. Uh. But so anyway, Zerdo Ramirez goes beyond
what those two guys did. One more thing. Three years ago, he's
defending the WBO super middleweight title before he fought Bevil. He now wins a
cruiserweight title three three years later. That's something to be said for that too.
It's not like he's been spending the last three years at light heavyweight and
then a cruiserweight Listen to line. Yeah, when our pal Chris Mannix was
interviewing him in the ring after the fight, and Chris asked him about having
the confidence to stand there basically in front of this big, strong guy,
Uh, you know, you know what, what what made what gave you
that confidence he had? He smiled and he basically said, you know,
he was speaking in English, he said, he said, I'm a big
boy. Like in other words, I'm a big boy also, and you
know he looked pretty good. I mean, and you know, I don't
know how you do against you know Ji Opataia or some of the other cruiserweights,
Miris Bradst and all that. But uh, you know, his design
is to to unify if he can do so in the cruiserweight division. He
talked about in the pre fight about eventually trying to make a move and but
in the heavyweight division. So look, Zero did a good job. He
won the fight, he won the title, he made history doing it,
had a lot of fans there, and uh, you know, he's another
big win for for Golden Boy. As a promoter, I told you,
folks, we got a lot to go over. Let's go quickly. Alexis
Roche won on the undercard at the Golden Boys show in Inglewood. Thought on
his TKL went over Frederic Lawson. Yeah, I thought that. I thought
that Roachid did a good job. I mean, you know, he was
in a kind of a rough spot after what happened in the fall when he
he suffered a you know, kind of a big surprising upset knockout lost a
who was it the Giovanni Santion. Uh that was a that was a bit
of a surprise. And here he comes against Lawson, who had been stopped
in that very controversial first round by Virgil Ortiz, and uh this was a
matter of to get back, and you know, he looked good. He
won every round. I mean, look, he clearly he's the favorite to
do what he did. Uh, So I'm not going to sit here and
tell you that it was some kind of surprise that he did. But for
a guy coming off Lawson got stopped by Ortiz and round one, but it
was a shit stoppage and he wasn't really daving guard. He didn't get damaged
or anything like that. There was a lot of controversies about that. But
when when roach A lost to Santion, he got he got beat up.
I mean, he took a lot of Halaysia shots, a lot of punishment.
He picked himself up, he got back in the ring and he kicked
Frederick Lawson's ass. I mean, the amount of punches that he landed.
It was just a total nomination. The pressure and finally in the end,
you know, I was glad to see the loss in corner did the right
thing by pulling him out of the fight after the seventh round. So roach
is back. I mean, you know, he he I don't know if
he's in ever be world champion, but you know what, the welterweight division
is kind of wide open because Crawford and Spencer out of there. I think.
I think alexis Rocha, who has a great style to watch, a
good attitude, a good fan base, a golden boy, a promoter that
knows how to move their guys. No reason whatsoever that he can't be back
in the mix for some kind of you know, top fight eliminator, even
a world title fight. Good for him. All right, let's back up
to Fronty Night against the recap podcast. The Fight Freaking Night recap pikers were
recapping everywhere. Let's go back to that card you referenced in Glendale, Arizona,
where Oscar Valdez in the main event for ESPN Plus and Top Rank,
scored a and a very impressive TKO over Liam Wilson. The common opponent was
e Manuel Navoraatee had beaten both of these guys, but Wilson had Navarate down,
had him hurt. Navarate eventually came back and stopped him. All right,
since then Valdez had lost to Navorate So this was kind of like you
said, the consolation bracket, the losers bracket, who's gonna end up getting
the win, Valdez very impressive in that main Evandi becomes the WBO interim junior
lightweight champ. Quick thoughts on what you saw from Oscar Valdez Friday night.
Well, the reason why this was so important for both these fighters is because,
yeah it was it was made the interim title like basically the week of
the fight. But everybody knows that the interim tag is most likely going to
be taken off of that and the guy is going to become the full champion
because in May you have Navarete fighting in the lightweight division for the vacant WBO
title. Now he'll be the favorite against Denny Brenchick, but even if he
loses the fight, I'd be really shocked if Navarette came back down to one
hundred and thirty pounds, just giving all the problems he's had making the weight.
So this was sort of like they're filling the vacancy before it becomes vacant.
So Oscar Valdez, I believe at some point in the spring where you
know certainly by like you know June is going to become the full WBO title
or so he's going to be a player. He's got probably one of the
biggest names in the weight class, if not the biggest, and you know
he's right there for some big fights. First of all, similar to Tim
Zoo, Oscar Valdez is the ultimate warrior. This guy will fight through anything.
You know, He's had injuries. He fought through the broken jaw.
I always remember that fight because I was there for that. Again, Scott
Clig went big. Quig didn't make the weight and he and he and he
had a broken jaw Oscar early in the fight. Oscar val does one my
favorite fighters in boxing. I mean him and Zoo both frankly, and in
the fact they were both fighting on the same weekend. You know, I
was enjoying myself immensely watching those two fights. Uh, he did a really
good job. I mean I thought he would beat Liam Wilson. Lean Wilson
is a good fighter, but as he made the point after the fight,
he's right, he didn't use his brain. He's smarter. He should be
smarter. The way he fights. He wasn't a smart fighter the way handled.
He was basically handling Wildez early by using his length and his jab and
keeping him on the outside, and he got he let Oscar Valdez do what
Oscar Valve does best, which is drag him into a knock down, drag
out, grind it out, you know, just a real rough war.
And he did not survive that, and he got stopped. And I wasn't
a surprise to me. Valdez has a good chin, he's got smarts,
he's got experience. This to me was the epitome of an intelligent, a
veteran fighter that's not over the hill, imposing his not only imposing himself physically
on his opponent, but imposing himself intelligently and mentally on his opponent, like
he was too smart for what Wilson brought to the table. And I like
the fact that after the fight, similar to the way I talked about the
way that Bernard Hopkins approached Kelly Pavlick, don't give up. I'll help you
stick to it. You've got a chance. You know, you know this,
you know, go back to the drawing board, don't give up.
He had that sort of same pep talk with Liam Wilson both in the ring,
and then they showed U afterwards them in the dressing room. After the
fact. Valdez is just as nice a guy outside the ring as you canna
ask for. And he's just a fucking animal inside the ring. I just
love watching him fight. And he's now in the position where he's going to
get other big fights because he's got a great name and a great style and
a great fan base. So look, there was two big names that were
not big names, but two important fighters that were there that are both with
Top Rank also that could loom as a future opponent, Oshaki Foster, who's
the WBC champion, so by the time he gets elevated, it could become
a unification fight. And you've got Luis Alberto Lopez, who is the IBF
featherweight title holder, who was bursting at the seams and wants to go up
in wait. That'd be a great Mexican, all Mexican kind of fight.
And you know, Top Rank has some other fighters in their stable, Consasao
and others at one hundred and thirty, I mean there are you know,
because that would be a rematch obviously of some controversy that occurred in the past
when Valdez beat him. So he's sitting pretty right now. He's overjoyed to
have another title and he deserved it. He did a heck of a job
against Liam Wilson, and it was a packed arena looked like for whatever the
ticket availability was. It was a big crowd in the Glendale Desert Diamond Arena.
And I say that as we release this podcast because I'm headed to stay
right beside that arena for the basketball Final Four later this week because across the
street in the massive Arizona Cardinal Stadium is where the basketball Yukon, Alabama,
Purdue, and c State games. I'm literally staying next to that arena where
they fought the other night and in the co features Sonissa Estrada became the four
belt strawweight women's world champ with a ten round decision, and this was an
intriguing fight in that these two fighters did not like each other. Estrada was
taunting her during the fight and landing against you all, Costa Vaye, your
thoughts real quick in the recap mode as Estrada gets her hand raised and is
the undisputed champ. Before I get to that, I just thought of this
other thing. As we were talking about Liam Wilson and Valdez, and obviously
Navarette is an important figure in both of their careers. We discussed the horrendous
scorecard of Chris Flores that he had in the Roly Romero hip Goal Cruse fight.
Thank god it wasn't needed because of the knockout. And he also worked
as a judge in the Valdez fight that happened on Friday night. He was
the referee in the Navarete Liam Wilson fight that a lot of people were disgusted
with because the perception that he gave such a long count and and Liam Wilson's
point of view was that I was robbed because it was like twenty for a
judge on the Romara fight, So hick a discipline refer So yeah, it's
it's definitely a controversial moment and again a controversial scorecard as well. And a
lot of a lot of judges are referees and the referees are used as judges
as well. But it's it's very interesting on both of those Back to the
back, Yeah, yeah, that was the other fight. Obviously. These
are two women that you know, they came into this fight each having two
of the titles in the one hundred and five pound way class bad blood,
like you mentioned, and they put on a good fight. It was a
heck of a fight, A lot of action. Uh Snissa Strada though similar
to like what I said about Valdez, I felt like she was the smarter
fighter. She was a little bit more of a versatile fighter, and it
was a close fight, and but she got the decision I think she deserved.
I thought she won the fight. It was a good fight. She
won ninety was it ninety seven to ninety three on all three of the scorecards?
You know? And Via was complaining and her manager was complaining like it
was like the most controversial decision that they ever saw in their life. I
don't know what they were thinking. I mean, you know, you can
be upset that you didn't win the fight, that's fine, But I agree
with the judges. I talked to some other people that were at the fight
that thought it the same thing. Watching it from the more the vantage point
of not being on television but being right there at ringside, she just did
a bit more, a little more pinpoint with the punches. You know,
Via had her moments, but it was really more one shot at a time.
And I thought one of the underrated aspects of this fight was that the
defense that a Shoda showed, you know, was pretty good. All things
considered, and she accomplishes what the goal was, which was to become and
disputed. She's wanted this, you know, we talked about it in the
interview. She'd been boxing since since she was eight years old, but before
there was even the notion that would ever be like an undisputed women's champion for
any weight class boxing and the women's side was a thing, but not as
it's being. And she's been along that ride because she's not a spring chicken
in terms of her career. She's not an old woman, so only thirty
one years old, but she's been a professional for like thirteen fourteen years.
So this is the culmination. I don't know, you know, after accomplishing
this, I know she wants to go back up and wait, probably to
fly Ways, maybe a Marlin, a Spars, a rematch, but I
wouldn't be totally shocked if, you know, a couple more fights and she
says, you know what I've done what my dream was, and I'm gonna
you know, I'm going to retire. Got my health. She can go
on and do other things, she can talk about boxing, you know,
do whatever she wants to do. But this was the culmination of a lot
of things she's worked hard for for a very very long time. And again
it's it's worth mentioning that a lot of these women, even as champions,
don't make a whole lot as it is. So she's she made good money.
He's in that position right now. So cash in is my point on
it. I think she made if my sources are accurate, she made around
four hundred thousand dollars for that fight. There you go, and so there's
a strong likelihood she'd make many She's she's been making that type of money for
recent fights, so there's a there's a strong likelihood there might even be a
little more in a fighter too. And then you're good, and she's got
a commentary career as well. That that awaits for Sonissa Estrada, who now
has the four belts. So we're at about forty or forty two minutes.
How's your phone batter you good? I'm looking yeah, I like thirty one
percent. All right, So let's do the Let's do the boxer, and
then we'll get through the news. You want to do all these news items?
You got five news items. We can kill a couple of you,
all right, Well, we can kill uh Shalom on the Bill, Im
Smith and Rock of Porcaus. It's not I don't have to hear you talk
about his mother's breast cancer liketed for the eightieth time. It's a great story.
We love great stories. Here we go, all right, so just
so we're gonna to kill. We're going to bring back up that the WBC
still hasn't tripped Jamal Charlow. Okay, here we go three two. All
right, wait, there's more. There's one more fight card. Oh it's
like against you a knife. We yes, we keep doing this. How
much would you pay now? Nineteen ninety five twenty nineinety five, there was
a Sunday afternoon boxer promotion Sky Sports, the UK Peacock streaming app in the
US heavyweight fight and Rayfiel before I hit the record button, going, we
got to talk about this heavyweight Wardley Clark showdown for the British heavyweight titles.
All right, it's on a platter for you here. I did not see
this again with all the NCAA tournament basketball. You're telling me you gotta see
it, you gotta see it, Okay, I have like we always keep
it real. Here, I must confess I couldn't. I did not watch
the entire fight. I didn't sit there and score the fight. I was
kind of going back and forth. I was watching the duke game. I
actually had to go out for something else I had to do with my family
for a little while. Had on my phone, so I wasn't paying super
close attention, but I did see enough of it to get the feel.
And then I saw what some of the people were writing about and tweeting about
and all that these guys put on a barn burner. I mean, let
me just say, this was a great fucking boxing weekend. There was no
big megafight, but there was a If you were a boxing fan, sure
and you're not happy after this week and then you need to find another planet
get something out of this weekend. Xerdo was a good fight. The Valdez
card was the heck of a card. The pay per view was outstanding.
Wardley and and uh uh and Fraser Clarks threw down. You know, you
had all kinds of good stuff going on. Uh but these guys really went
to battle, and in the end it turned out to be a majority I
split draw, I should say. Uh So, there was so much shit
going on in this spot. I can't even keep it all straight. I'm
gonna actually have to go back and watch the rest of Fraser Clark, you
know, the undefeated Olympic medalists from twenty twenty Tokyo taking on his British countryman,
Fabio Wardley, who was defending the British and the Commonwealth heavyweight titles important
UH titles in in UH in the UK. Clark went got knocked down in
the route in the fifth round he got deducted a point in UH. I
think it was round seven for low blows. But Wardley suffered some tremendous facial
damage to it, a like his nose was so when there was a period,
like he didn't look white like Tim Zoo because it wasn't on the scout,
but his nose sort of like what was going on with Fondort, was
just a mask of blood. By the end of the fight. I mean,
these guys put on what did I say in the preview? I said,
I hope these two guys just put on a good old fashioned heavyweight slober
knocker, and that's what they did. They put on a heavyweight slobbery knocker,
and like I said, I couldn't pay close attention to the whole thing
for various reasons. But I am definitely going back on my Peacock app and
I will find it on you on Demand, which they have all the events
that they've done in their archive there. It's very easy to use. You
can skip forward to it easily. Well, I pay for the version that
the commercials. But the point is another heavyweight fight, and I guess they
had it on my I actually asked Ben Shalumniz, who's the boxer promoter?
Why are you guys doing this fight on a Sunday, which is obviously a
little bit unusual. Apparently I have some kind of like banker holiday in the
UK, so nobody's working on Monday. So they decided to do the fight
on Sunday. Which where in London where this took place. It was the
evening when it was going on, obviously afternoon here in the United States.
But that's the reason why I was on a Sunday, because they didn't uh
they were able to do that with the work schedule in Sky Sports like to
Weick take, the logical thing is they got to do this again? Will
they do it again? Soon after? It ends up being a draw and
there's no winner. You know, I don't know. I mean I didn't
hear I didn't hear the postfight interviews, to tell you the truth, So
I don't know what they were saying afterwards. But just on the face of
it, it would seem like after that kind of fight that a rematch would
still probably be the biggest fight for both guys out there. Uh, you
know, I'm not sure what the appetite for Worthy to do that again is.
He might be able to go on and do something else, but uh
yeah, why not doing doing a rematch? I mean, they had a
good crowd there. It seemed like at the O two arena. You know,
he had, you know, some of their top young guys on the
undercard, Uh, you know, doing their thing. Ben Whitaker got to
win. But uh, this was a good heavyweight fight. I mean,
it was. It was exciting. It was it was it was. It
was a good cherry on top of an excellent weekend. Man, we gave
you a lot of fight recaps. Let's give you some news and some nostalgia
and get out of here. All right, what's the latest the Fury Usk
undercard. We're starting to find out some of the fights that are going to
be on this uh now coming from May, give me a little more on
what Turkey Ala Chik, the Saudi Arabia and Entertainment Authority head who's the boxing
matchmaker, give me a little more here on what we found out. They
remember the fight was originally supposed to take place in February, that the card
was pretty much already constructed, and so largely what they've done is they've taken
that card and just trans they've just moved it from whatever the original date was
in February to do it again in May. There've been a few changes,
though it's a very good under card. Also, one thing, you know,
whether you like the fact that these matchups are in Saudi Arabia, you
don't like the fact that they're in Saudi Arabia. One thing is for damn
Shore, the when the Saudis and Frank Warren and the folks that he works
with, whether it's Top Rank or it's Matchroom Boxing or the various promoters that
they've had involved in these events, they put on very very solid to great
undercars, no doubt about it. And this is another one that's in that
category. I mean, you can do you complain the co feature is Ji
Opatai in the rematch against myras Braatest. That was a first fight sign up.
Remember that was a fight where Opataia had a broken jaw through it the
title, I mean, very very outstanding fight. So they're fighting their rematch.
You've got Joe Cordina, who's a SUPERB champion at one hundred and thirty
pounds taken on Anthony Kasachi, which is a very solid, you know,
maybe not the biggest fight ever, but that's a worthy kind of matchup.
And then you got your boy at G Cabiel, who looks so great in
his last fight on one of these Saudi undercards. He's going to be on
against Frank Sanchez, who also has been on these Saudi undercards. Are doing
what you sometimes the matchmaking is not that complicated because you're mitching and matching the
guys that win on those cards and try to advance. And you know,
the added stakes to this particular fight is it's supposed to be a WBC final
eliminator, so the title the winner of this fight will become in line as
a mandatory title challenge. Now let's tied up. Obviously, the mandatory in
the BC is not going to be due for a little while, but it
puts the guy in position, and like I said, your boy Agi Kabiel
scored a very impressive knockout in the fourth round against arslen Beck Machmadov back on
the day of reckoning card and looked fantastic on that card, and Frank Sanchez
maybe didn't look as fantastic on that card. It took him a few rounds
to get a shit together, but he was on that same undercard, so
they're coming off the same length of time out of the ring, and he
knocked out Junior Fox quite spectacularly in the seventh round, So that makes sense.
You take the two winners from the show, you match them together.
It's got stakes covered, the aspect of the eliminator, and you add that
to this show. And then on top of that, you've got, you
know, not again the biggest fight ever sergyey Kovoleev, the former light heavyweight
champion. Now I've been Atker's weight coming back. Obviously he's not in a
huge fight. He's fighting Robin so far, I'm not shocked he's on this
card. I knew it from the beginning. He's got the same manager as
Usik and I'm sure that's how he got the spot. You got the lightweight
Mark Chamberlain from the UK, a popular fighter taking on Joshua Wahab. You
got the big time heavyweight prospect, Moses the Tama. He's on the show.
It's just a really good show. And the reason why we're talking about
it now is because his excellency Turkey alschik Uh put up some stuff in a
graphic of the matchups on his social media I think it was on Thursday or
Friday, and then like the next day, the PR team you know,
blasted out the particulars to the media list. So this is another excellent undercard
for by the way A, even if that had no undercard. The main
event is Tyson Ferry Alexander Russik for the undiscrited heavyweight Championship. That in and
of itself, all the other shit I just mentioned is like the gravy all
right, So again that's the undercard for May on that one. Let's go
chronologically, Taya Fimo Lopez is going to be back in the ring. I
gotta I gotta confess this is coming in late June. You've done some reporting
and found this out. He apparently he's gonna fight somebody named Steve Klagett or
Claggett. I don't know who. Just got what? What is this?
Who is this guy that he's defending against? Because I thought Taya Fimo was
headed to bigger things at the champion defending his title and doing this thing,
that's what. It's not a huge fight Steve Claggett. You know, look,
I'm not going to knock Steve Flaggtt. He's a hard working, tough
nosed guy. He doesn't have a great record, he's thirty eight and seven
with two draws, but he's got a long winning streak. He hasn't lost.
He's won a bunch of fights since twenty twenty one. He's been quite
active. Those of us, like myself were degenerates and dorks, et cetera
for boxing who watch a lot of the cards that come out of Canada on
the on ESPN Plus. He's on those types of shows. He's been on
there on a number of occasions over a recent past. He's with the folks
that I have the Tiger who top rank has done quite a bit of business
with so that will be most likely his opponent. It's not done yet,
but that's what they're looking at. They're gonna do you see I know you
see everything, but this was such a weekend of craziness. I happened to
see it. Did you see that? Raymond Moretaia's manager and fill in the
blanks he put on social media. They came to us and we said yes
to Taya Femo Lopez late June, and we're finding about this now on social
media that it's not us. That's what the manager paraphrasing basically said that we
said yes to fighting Teya Fimo Lopez. Very interesting, but yeah, I
mean telling the truth ahead Well that's Robert Garcia. I mean, Raymond Morettaia
was, without question one of the names on the list. What my sources
tell me I was going to get to this is that as they're making these
plans for Tiafimo to defend against now it apparently will be Steve Claggett. It'll
take place June twenty ninth. I am total take place. You might know
this because you're a Florida guy. That's taking place at the James L.
Knights Center in Miami. It's an available arena, have had a forty five
hundred seat place that's the University of Miami's basketball facility on their Coral Gables campus.
Yes, okay, So when they were trying to put this together,
there were four opponents that Top Rank offered to team Tiafimo, which is Tiafimo,
his father and David mcwater who was the manager, and the names that
I was told that were offered for this particular fight. Besides you know,
there was Claggett obviously. One of them was Raymond Maritaia, who, by
the way, he fought on the undercard, fighting on the Oscar of Valdez
Liam Wilson cart and even though he won, that was one of the worst
performances for more Tie that I have seen, So he can pipe down about
fighting for the title, right, Okay? With that aside, So Moritai
was one of the names. Another one is Elvis Rodriguez, who was formerly
with Top Rank, then was with PBC and then I had become a gift
free agent. He was offered the fight. And then you have Kenneth Simms,
who was an excellent fighter who won an eliminator in one hundred and forty
pounds in the I believe was a WBA eliminator who parted ways in the last
couple of weeks with PBC, so he's been out there as a free agent
also, I believe. So the names were Claggett, sims were Rodriguez and
Maritaya, and Team Tiafimo decided they would prefer the Steve Laggett fight. Now,
what's interesting about that card is I had reported previously that come June,
we were going to see a rematch between Raphael Espinoza and Robas Ramirez for the
SUPERB featherweight title fight that big upset and that dramatic game, and a top
rank said they weren't even like off the record, they said, we're gonna
I wrote about this, you know, a month or so ago. We're
gonna have them rematch with each other this summer, and it was probably gonna
be again in South Florida. So the Espinosa people really wanted to have a
home defense or some other defense before they did the rematch. So after that
kind of fight, top rank was like, okay, fine, so they're
gonna give Espinosa a rematch, another rematch. You're gonna give me another defense
sometime this summer. Robasi will fight on the tia Fimo undercart In the co
feature, and if I mean, if Robasi wins his undercard fight and at
another date in the summer, Raphaelspinoza wins his fight defense, they will fight
each other this fall in the rematch. So the rematch is still on the
Dockett, It's just not going to be immediate. They'll each have one interim
fight in between, and we'll see the rematch in the fall. I'm okay
with that. Build that up a little bit now. The following week is
the Shakur Stevenson main event for Top Rank, and you have the opponent here
for July sixth, for him go ahead with the Lakers. A few weeks
ago, I had reported that he was going to in fact fight six at
the Prudential Center in Newark, which is his hometown, defending the lightweight belt
for the first time that he had won in that very rancid, terrible fight
that we saw against what was what was that fight against against? That was
on the weekend of the the big race F one race in Las Vegas,
and uh, it was anything but exciting, that is for sure. So
he is going to come back and try to shake it off the stink of
that fight, you know, he obviously had some issues going into that match
with some injuries and some other problems. Uh, that fight took place back
in November, so now he's coming back July sixth, and so I am
told by multiple sources his opponent will be Artam Cardatunian, who is twelve and
one with seven knockouts, a German fighter, a born in Armenia but lives
in Germany. Only seven knockouts. I'm a little surprised by this level of
opponent, but if you take a look at his recent record, his last
fight, you know, sometimes you can win for losing. That's sort of
what Artem Hardaitunian has done. Because in July of twenty twenty three, he
fought against Frank Martin, who was an undefeated up and comer at that time
who turned down the opportunity to fight Sir Course Stevenson. And he lost a
pretty competitive fight against Frank Martin in that fight. So that is going to
be his reward for maybe exposing Frank Martin a little bit in that fight by
getting a title opportunity probably against ra Course Stevenson. But and again that's a
little far off. It's in July, right after July fourth, that that'll
be July sixth, that that'll be having one more news out of him.
You talked at linked about Bam Rodriguez and Juan Francisco Estrada as we went into
the weekend in the preview pod. We're on the recap pod here. There's
one other note that he has gone ahead and vacated his flyweight title, So
tell me more about why he did this as it sets up for that fight
in late June as well. Now, a lot of fighters, when they
have a fight for a title in another weight class, they wait till that
fight occurs before they obviously vacate any other belts because that's their leverage. If
they lose, they can always return to their weight division and defend those belts,
kind of like what rave Argus did recently. But in the case of
Van Rodriguez's obviously already been a champion in the one hundred and fifteen pound way
class. He won the title or one of the belts at one hundred twelve
pounds in the flyway division. He scored a very important and outstanding victory against
Sonny Edwards back at the end of last year or no, I guess it
was early this year. I forget the date of it whatever, but anyway,
the bottom line was he stops Sonny Edwards and he unified two of the
titles. So now he signed for the Wan Franciscuastrata fight to go back up
to one fifteen challenge for his old title as well as the lineal title,
and so before that happens, he then in the last few days had his
people send letter thanking the WBO, thanking the IBF for the opportunities, but
he vacated the belts and so he's on to the June twenty ninth big time
fight against Wan Frince Squastrata. And as an aside to that, one of
the fights that I am told that I recorded about on my substack, people
should read my notebook at Dan ray Tail dot substack dot com. Hels to
pause that their working matrim is to finalize a fight for that undercart between Sonny
Edwards and Adrian Kuriel, who was the former title holder in the one hundred
in the junior flyweight division. Memory yet that big knockout against Nnsinga then lost
in the rematch, So when I heard about that fight, my first thought
was, oh wow, so so Kuriel is going to go up and fight
Sonny Edwards. When I talked to some folks involved, I was no,
no, no, no, no, young man. But Sonny Edwards is
looking to go down to one hundred eight pounds to drop down to fight Kiio,
So that would if they're able to get the fight done, that is
what's going to probably be the co feature on the night that Bam Rodrigez and
one Francis Squash try to get their business together. There by the way,
that's a good fight. Also interesting take that one. Both guys need to
win because Sonny got beaten up by Bam in that title shot. Okay,
one piece of nostalgia before we depart April Fools is Monday. As we release
this podcast April first, eighteen years ago. Monday is a WBO heavyweight title
fight on Showtime, a big time slugfest that I really don't know anything about.
I got to go back and search this one, but you're gonna tell
me about it. Tell me that you don't know this fight. TJ Sergei
Elayak and Layman Brewster. Lyyakovich wins the fight and Rayfhael is saying highly underrated,
real quick so I've talked about like people say, what's the best heavyweight
fight you've been to or that you've watched. So when I think about the
heavyweight fights I've covered or written about, you know, I was fortunate to
be at Lewis against clitchkow Uh the other Klitschko Vladimir against Anthony Joshua, Deontay
Wilder against Tyson Ferior, the third fight, those types of fights. And
when you think about great heavyweight slugfests and big time fights, obviously you think
about Ali Fraser. You think about Larry Holmes and Kenny Norton. You think
about the historic trilogy between Riddick Bow and Evander Holyfield, you think about Mike
Tyson and Buster Douglas. I mean, those are the fights that jump to
your mind. The action, high stakes. This was not at that level
in terms of the notoriety, but punch for punch in terms of entertainment value,
excitement, drama, Sergey lyak Covid and Layman Brewster is probably the most
underrated heavyweight title fight maybe ever. I mean, that's how good this thing
was. This was a showtime main event. It took place in Cleveland.
You say, why was it in Cleveland when Leyman Brewster is from California,
Los Angeles, Harry and Lyakovich is from I think Belarus. The reason it
was in Cleveland was because that's Don King's hometown. Yeah again, and made
a deal to do the fight in Cleveland. So that's he We're got to
do it in Cleveland going. So the fight was in Cleveland, headlined the
showtime card and at the end of the day, these two guys got in
the ring, they beat the living shit out of each other. It really
ended in Bruser's career in many respects because he got the the the a lot
of damage that they got to detach retina in his left eye from a first
round punch that ultimately ended his career. But you know, it still hampers
him, you know, even today. But that was a very very memorable
battle, as you said, like but which he did more of the damage.
He ended up winning a unanimous decision. It was quite close. I
just looked up the scores. It was one seventeen, one to ten on
one card. That's kind of why it obviously, but one fifteen, one
twelve, fifth Team one thirteen, superb superb fight. Brewster, even though
he lost, he did get a knockdown against Laikovich in round seven, So
there was some drama and it was just an outstanding fight. Now, after
this fight was over, Brewster was off for like, I don't know,
maybe a year year and a half. He came back and he took the
beatdown in the rematch against Vladimir Klitchko in Germany. But this was even though
he lost his fight, this was like his last high peak moment. And
for Layakhovich, you know, he went on and had some other notable fights,
but this was by far, in a way, his most memorable fight
of his career, and it was just it was a very spectacular fight.
And I'm actually kind of surprised that you've never seen this fight, DJ,
because on it you've put me onto it. I got to go look for
it. Eighteen years ago, Monday, April first, two thousand and six.
The thing about is neither guy was ever really the same. That's the
damage they did, because, like I mentioned, Brewster came back and got
beat up by Klitchkow and his career was basically over. And in his next
fight, you had Sergey Lakovich defending the title and getting this is another it
wasn't it was a terrible fight, but the ending was as dramatic as a
guess. He defended the title like five six months later against Shannon Briggs and
in the twelfth round at you talk about Meldrick Taylor Chavez with two seconds left,
how about Shannon Briggs lyak Coovich with one second left? And Shannon Briggs
knocked Lyakovich out of the ring onto the floor and won the fight and the
title by a knockout in the twelfth round. Incredible And again, wait,
you gave me a second homework assignment. I gotta find that ending as well
for Briggs and Layakovich. I got two Layakovich homework assignments for that night.
Brewster and Briggs were among the best heavyweights out there. And it goes to
show you that again, anything can happen one punch, in this case many
hundreds of punches, and neither of these fighters were ever the same. They
never won another big fight the rest of their careers. Lyakovich and Brewster eighteen
years ago. Man, what a what a pod tremendous recap of all those
fight cards from Vegas to Inglewood, to Arizona and even to England. Why
don't we relow in a new month, shall we no pooland no fool And
it's April on Monday, and uh, we get ready for another week.
And I look forward to being with you later this week for the big Fight
weekend preview. I'm sorry about to do Blue Devils for you from my bracket
pools where I had Duke and I was in great shape had they just won
the game such by the way, Yeah, we had so much shit to
go over this week with the fights in the news that we actually had a
show in the interview. I'll just tell the folks we have coming up.
We're not sure which day were going to run it, but I had a
very good interview with Devin Haney in training Camps. Ryan Garcia. Yeah,
I think we've heard of him, so Devin Haney in a subsequent pod coming
up, not on this pod, but in a subsequent pod coming up.
Right. But had this been one of those weekends where there was like only
one or two fights and there was not like going on, you know,
maybe we'd run we would have run the interview. But there was so much
stuff that we had to deal with in terms of all that. And I
can still talk about these fights for another hour if you want, But We're
not going to do that tonight. I think we're good. So Devin Haney
coming up on a subsequent and show for now, my friend, thank you.
Do well this week. We'll be back in touch. I'm headed to
Arizona late in the week for the college basketball Final four to see if Yukon
has the repeat or not. Dan, you can visit the location of where
Shannon Briggs knocked uh knocking Michaelvich out of the ring. It was at Chase
Stiels and Phoenix. There you go, all right, among other things.
Could be busy with the college basketball as well. Have a good week,
my friend. Thank you, As always to man there it goes. Dan
Rayfield find his substack. Dan Rayfield's substack at Fight Freaks Unite on Substack.
You've been listening here to the Fight Freaks You Unit recap as part of the
Big Fight Weekend podcast feed for Dan Rayfield on TJ Reeves. Great stuff on
the recap. Have a great week, everybody,